Mendeleev Volcano Fumarole Field, Kunashir

An active stratovolcano above the Pacific, four sulfur fields steaming in the silver-fir forest, and a beach hot enough to cook a crab in the sand. Mendeleev is the most rewarding day on Kunashir, and the one that justifies the flight south.

What you'll do

We leave Yuzhno-Kurilsk by 4x4 in mid-morning — late departures avoid the coastal fog that lifts off the Pacific overnight. The road runs 17 km along the eastern coast of Kunashir to a trailhead in the silver-fir forest at the foot of the volcano. From here it is roughly three kilometres on foot to the upper solfatara field, between two and three hours round trip depending on group fitness and how long you linger at the vents.

The trail begins under tall fir, then narrows into a tunnel of head-high Kuril bamboo (Sasa kurilensis) — long sleeves and trousers required, the leaves cut. The forest thins as you climb. The first sign of the field is olfactory before it is visual: a sharp mineral note, then the trees give way to bare grey ash streaked sulfur-yellow, and you arrive at one of the four solfatara fields that ring the central cone. Vents hiss at fifty to a hundred degrees Celsius, mud pools bubble, and the rock is crusted with crystallised sulfur the colour of new butter. Your guide will show you the safe stand-points and the older Japanese-built channels still visible from the Karafuto era when the slopes were prospected for sulfur.

On the descent we drop east to Goryachy Plyazh — Hot Beach — where geothermal springs rise through black volcanic sand. You can dig your own warm pool at low tide, soak briefly, and rinse in the open Pacific a few metres on. We finish with a hot lunch at a small kitchen in the settlement: fresh saury, miso-style soup, Kunashir berries.

Sensory and what makes it AMIST

Mendeleev is one of the few accessible active volcanoes in the Russian Far East where guests can stand metres from a working solfatara without ropes or permits — but the trail is unsigned, the bamboo is disorienting, and the safe stand-points shift season to season as vents open and close. Our guide is licensed by Kurilsky Nature Reserve and trained at the Institute of Marine Geology and Geophysics in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. We cap groups at six, carry a satellite communicator, and supply gaiters, gloves and a printed micro-map of the upper field.

For VIP and corporate guests we add a private helicopter return from Yuzhno-Kurilsk that loops over the Tyatya volcano caldera on the way north — the most photographed view in the southern Kurils, available only on calm-weather days.

Practical notes

• Duration: 7–9 hours door to door from Yuzhno-Kurilsk; transfer 30 min each way, hike 2–3 h round trip.
• Departure point: your hotel or guesthouse in Yuzhno-Kurilsk. Kunashir is reached by Aurora flight from Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk; AMIST handles the full air leg and border-zone permit.
• Best season: mid-June through early October. Border-zone permits take 30 days — we file them as soon as your dates are confirmed.
• Included: 4x4 transfer, licensed reserve guide, gaiters and gloves, hot lunch, Hot Beach stop. Helicopter return optional.
• Bring: long sleeves and trousers (bamboo cuts), sturdy waterproof boots, swimsuit and a quick-dry towel for Hot Beach, layered insulation — temperatures at the field run 10°C cooler than the coast.
• Note: Mendeleev's last confirmed eruption was a small phreatic event in 1880; solfatara activity is continuous and monitored. Smithsonian GVP code 290020.

Why we run this

The southern Kurils sit on the Pacific Ring of Fire and most of their volcanoes are either inaccessible or out of bounds. Mendeleev is the rare exception: an 888-metre stratovolcano with four working sulfur fields, a half-day's walk from a paved road, ending at a beach that warms the soles of your feet. AMIST has run guided programmes on Kunashir since the early 2010s, when commercial flights to Mendeleev Airport became regular, and our south-Kuril guide has logged this trail more than two hundred times.